Martin Luther King Jr. Magnet School community pleads with district leaders to keep middle school grades

Lauren Herring’s daughter spent two years at her zoned middle school before being accepted into Martin Luther King Jr. Magnet School.Herring says she desperately wanted her daughter to thrive at her zoned school, however it soon became clear that her academic needs, which demanded more robust and rigorous educational experiences, would not be met there.Her story is not unique among MLK parents and that’s why dozens of parents, teachers, and students attended Tuesday night’s Metro Nashville Public Schools Board of Education meeting to push back on the plan to remove MLK’s middle school. Supporters instead urged board members to add a sixth-grade to the existing 7-12 grade school to accommodate the demand for more academic magnet middle seats.Currently, MLK’s high school is under capacity with 300 seats available and nine empty classrooms. There is a waitlist for its middle school enrollment.“It is baffling to me that (schools director) Dr. Battle would consider taking away these opportunities from students instead of adding sixth-grade to MLK. Academic magnet schools are meant to reach students who desire to go faster, further, and deeper into topics that cannot be covered when teachers must teach to the middle 50 percent of the class,” said Herring. “Many parents want rigor and high standards, and the district should continue to offer this at MLK for middle school students.”The district announced the plan to remove MLK’s middle school in December and it’s a part of the MNPS ReimaginED equity roadmap. Currently, students can attend regular middle school for two years before applying to attend MLK from seventh-grade, or feed into the school from its affiliated schools such as Rose Park Middle School.MLK would transition to grades 9-12 in the 2027/2028 school year and increase the number of seats in those grades by more than 100. Under the new model, MLK’s middle school grades would fold into the nearby Head Magnet Middle School. There are eight magnet middle schools in the district. MLK is one of two that continue into high school.Director of Schools Dr. Adrienne Battle told board members at a meeting in December that the plan represents years of study."We're trying to align our pathways across the district and really thinking about continuity of academic programming," said Battle. "We want to definitely not lose anything that's working for our students and our staff and our families. We want to just elevate that in a way that provides even more robust learning opportunities for our students."Members of the MLK community expressed frustration over the lack of transparency in the decision and the lack of opportunities for community input and feedback. Some mentioned that there was no warning of this topic prior to December.“I am choosing to speak today because I’m opposed to the plan to eliminate seventh and eighth-grade from MLK created without input from the MLK community. Although it has been almost three months since the plan was announced, there have not been any public forums scheduled for stakeholders to share feedback as promised,” said parent Carlos Cordova.Parents and faculty told the school board that removing seventh and eighth-grade would negatively impact the already limited academic magnet middle school seats. Students told the board that removing them would remove the necessary opportunities for middle school students, such as having mentors and growth opportunities.Middle school faculty also risk being removed with the change along with various academic opportunities like the foreign language department.Additionally, there are no plans to add more magnet middle options.“Phasing out seventh and eighth grade from MLK will reduce 40 percent of academic magnet spots from future middle schoolers. There is a demand and need for more academic magnet seats. That’s why MLK Middle and Meiggs consistently have waitlists,” said parent Katina Edmoncott.“Questions I would like answered, have you considered how removing the seventh and eighth-grade affects the high school? Have you thought about adding sixth-grade to MLK instead of removing the seventh and eighth-grade?” said MLK seventh-grade science teacher Carlene Taylor.U.S. News and World Report ranked MLK as one of the top middle schools in Davidson County and one of the top five schools in the state.Many speakers also commented that MLK’s unique structure is what helps foster its diversity. Student council president Trey Madison emphasized why that’s important.“It’s a place where seventh-graders can have senior mentors who guide them through their first year at the school. A place where people learn not how different we are, but how similar we are to each other and how there is nothing to be gained from hate and judgement. I see a lot of talk on the news about how diverse Nashville is. Well, MLK is just about as representative of Nashville as you can get,” said Madison. “We know that the way our school is structured is different from MNPS, but I’ve never known our board of education – or our city – get rid of something just because it’s different. Uniformity for uniformity’s sake is pointless.”Parent Bobby McDonald told board members it was important for his daughters to attend a diverse school with diverse faculty. This is why he and his wife enrolled his eighth-grade daughter in a small, but locally well-known private school and plans to do the same with his fourth-grade daughter who would be affected by the removal of MLK’s middle school.“Families of high-achieving fourth-grade students can have a big decision to make. You can either continue through fifth-grade and hope to win a lottery seat at an academic magnet middle school such as MLK, or if it is an option, you have to decide to apply to private school in the fourth grade because that is where most private schools in Davidson County have their entry year. So eliminating middle school grades at MLK further compounds our dilemma,” said McDonald. “It should not be the case that we’ve actually had to choose private school as a way to gain a high-level academic achievement and also diversity in our daughter’s education.”