School Reopened in Lower 9th Ward, But Struggle Isn’t Over

Story by Daniela Rible
Black and white photography by Mavis Yorks
Color photography by Daniela Rible

Following numerous months of arduous struggle, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Charter School for Science and Technology finally had something to celebrate the morning of Sunday, June 10, at its rededication ceremony. Outside the school the jubilant crowd cheered as Joseph Recasner, dean of students, called on the community to “take pride in what has been done. Let the world know that the city of New Orleans is coming back and the Lower 9th Ward is already back.” King school is the first to reopen in the Lower 9th Ward since Hurricane Katrina.

The Original Pin-Stripe Brass Band and the Zulu Walking Warriors paraded into the auditorium with dancing guests in tow. In front of an arc of yellow and white balloons with a large portrait of Martin Luther King on stage, they entertained nearly one thousand people in true New Orleans style. Parents and friends excitedly greeted one another and waved fans with images of Martin Luther King Jr.

Steven Martin, King’s board liaison, introduced this year’s graduating class, honor students, teachers and staff, who sashayed down the red carpet as parents and the community cheered.

Fifth-grader Dre’Shaun Napoleon welcomed and thanked the guests for “opening the doors of our beloved school…at the place we call home.”

Of course, King school principal Doris Hicks was thrilled to finally be home. But as several speakers had alluded to, Hicks reiterated that the homecoming is bittersweet, because over 30 students and family members lost their lives during Katrina. “So we take this rededication and dedicate it to their memories,” she said.

In her passionate address, Councilwoman Cynthia Willard Lewis asked guests to honor the children who lost their lives during the hurricane and are no longer with us.

Hicks emphasized that the school has always been a beacon in the community. King opened 11 years before Katrina hit, and, like many of the staff members, Hicks was raised in the Lower 9th Ward.

But reopening the school and merely locating a temporary site has been an endless, struggling journey. School board members and city officials stood in the way and limited the progress towards renovating the school. When Hicks and King staff approached them soon after the storm, they responded saying it would take three to five years to repair the damages.

"It has been a Herculean effort to get this school open," said Louella Givens, of the Louisiana State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education (BESE). "Doris Hicks should go down in history as a woman of vision and a woman of courage. Doris Hicks said, 'I'm opening my school whether you want me to or not.' "

The first few sites King staff was offered to temporarily house and educate children were in deplorable condition and too hazardous. After visiting numerous buildings,
the principal, teachers and residents negotiated to have another school open in Fall 2006. The school was Colton, another old facility that was in appalling disrepair.

Hicks visited Colton and said, “No, not my babies. My children deserve to be in a school facility that gives them dignity and respects them as human beings.”

Promises were made to clean the building and there were numerous delays for opening dates, moving the charter application’s original deadline of Aug. 11 to Sept. 7, 2006. Despite the building being unfinished, teachers, parents and leaders from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) went to the dilapidated site and held classes for the first day on the school’s lawn and front steps, with about 250 to 300 students. Some local, state officials and council persons also attended to show their support.

A movement began in front of the school and hundreds marched down St. Claude Avenue to the new BESE building near the Lower 9th Ward to demand a meeting with Robin Jarvis, the Recovery School District (RSD) superintendent. They took over a room and continued to hold classes, with SCLC members teaching the young students about the history of the civil rights movement.

Jarvis met with them and, after a negotiation session, it was agreed that another temporary school was available immediately, Edgar P. Harney Elementary on Willow St. in Uptown. Previously, King staff were told that Harney had considerable flood damage, when in fact it was minimal compared to the King site which had up to 17 feet of water. All the while Lower 9th residents watched public schools in other neighborhoods, primarily white neighborhoods, reopen.

“Everyone said, why didn’t they offer this (site) in the beginning?” added Recasner.

“It was a profound moment because we marched for our children. We made certain that we were not going into that building. Nothing was up to par,” said parent Nikkisha Napoleon.

They continued to appeal to the State School Board of their plans to return to their original home and that the school was worth fixing.

“We understood that our school would be the anchor of the rebuilding in the Lower 9th Ward. The delay was based on poor planning because the state had no plan,” said Recasner.

While Satterfield & Pontikes Construction, Inc. began working on the building, King staff continuously pushed and lobbied the state officials to ensure the building would be ready to open by the agreed upon timeline, January 2007, to coincide with Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. But come January, the repairs weren’t completed.

After Katrina, Hicks and King staff applied and completed the process of changing King to a charter school, an idea that had been discussed before the storm. As a charter school, its students range from pre-kindergarten through grade 8, compared to pre-kindergarten through grade 6 previously. Approximately 450 students attended in the 2006-07 school year and 600 are registered to attend when school reopens in August.

The original seed was planted months prior in early March, at a Lower 9th Ward resident meeting held by Common Ground, when then-volunteer Lisa Fithian proposed to clean out the school. She and other volunteers understood that this was critical to the community returning home without waiting anymore for the sluggish government to do the right thing.

In mid March 2006, hundreds of students arrived to volunteer at Common Ground over their spring break. More than 200 of the volunteers participated in a training, informing them that they may be risking arrest if they stepped foot on the King site. Frustrated by the inaction of local and state authorities, on March 16, residents and volunteers took matters into their own hands. Volunteers wore Tyvek suits, all-day cleanup efforts began and community members spoke about the importance of Martin Luther King Jr. and the history of the school. A large amount of black and civil rights literature, images and photographs were salvaged.

“When I saw Martin Luther King’s picture, I knew I was definitely there to be a part of it,” says Dan Williams, a Lower 9th Ward resident and Common Ground volunteer.

“One of the things that was so powerful about it is that this was a really prominent black school,” adds Fithian.

The following day New Orleans Police shut down the clean up operation and threatened to arrest volunteers and community members. A series of meetings took place over the weekend, which connected Common Ground with Jarvis.

Jarvis wrote a resolution to the local city council, affirming that volunteers and Lower 9th Ward residents would have the right to clean up the school for immediate use and with the hope of reopening it sooner than the three to five years originally promised. The City Council eventually passed the resolution, after an attempted block due to last-minute changes.

Cleaning resumed the following week, but the obstacles continued. The RSD said it could not rebuild, claiming the school wasn’t structurally sound nor had enough water pressure in the building, though they didn’t have the required documents to back up their claims. Again they attempted to send in the police. Hicks, however, had a report from engineers from Denver who assessed the property in Jan. 2006, declaring it structurally sound. New Orleans Sewage and Water Board confirmed that there was sufficient water pressure, so the police backed down.

“It really became a symbol of hope and got a lot of people active. It was hugely significant because this was the first mass direct action in New Orleans. After that you had things happening at St. Augustus church and St. Bernard project. And a number of them reference the King fight for giving an inspiration to engage in these tactics,” said Fithian.

“I’d hate to think where we’d be had Common Ground not come in. We’d still be struggling and trying to indicate to them that children of color should be educated in an environment that is conducive. After Common Ground did that, it suddenly moved up on the priority list because so many people got involved,” said Hicks.

But Hicks adds that the battle still isn’t over. Not only must King staff now sign a lease written by the recovery district for usage of their building, but she finds the lease completely unacceptable. In the lease, the recovery district requests control of the building or to have another school on the site with King, so Hicks and staff continue in negotiations.

“Why do we have to sign a lease first of all for a school that belongs to us?” asks Hicks.

Though Hicks says it is a big step to have the building, “it is more like scratching the surface.”