In 1790, New York state side of Governors Island, near the tip of Manhattan, for the benefit of education. For over two centuries, however, was in the hands of the military, protecting the nation’s largest port.
Soon, the original terms of this grant to be honored past, and it seems fair that a public school dedicated to the harbor of New York itself will be the first tenant to occupy military red brick buildings on the island.
It’s been a decade since Murray Fisher imagined Urban Assembly New York Harbor School, and six years since it opened in what were supposed to be short-term coastal districts of Central Brooklyn. Sometime next year will be the last move to a permanent home on the coast here.
Fisher, a youthful appearance, blond 35-year-old native of Virginia, poured most of his 20 years and 30 years and get your dream started in Brooklyn. Most other discussions has happened and to fight against bureaucrats and developers, fighting to secure a few meters from the city, 600 kilometers of coastline for its creation.
___
Port of New York is by some measures of the biologically richest body of water in North America, and Fisher can hardly believe how little regard most New Yorkers pay.
Wooden piers that once extended from the street almost every city of the Cross, but access to water today is elusive. Most city children – especially poor, minority children from school serves – might as well live in Kansas. Fisher wants to connect the body to explain and enrich the life of the city.
Fisher’s great-uncle was LeMoyne Billings, a high school friend of John F. Kennedy. The nephew of the president, environmentalist Robert Kennedy Jr., spent summers in high school to working parents on a ranch in Fisher did in Colombia.
Years later, after reading Kennedy’s book "The Riverkeepers," a call to citizens to take responsibility of bodies of water around them, Fisher wrote to Kennedy, and eventually went to work for groups Hudson Riverkeeper and Waterkeeper Alliance.
They were long hours and low pay, investigate complaints of pollution and speak to school groups. But along the Hudson met with people with little formal education, as environmental management, however, had taught to communicate, make allegations, and lead.
Fisher realized that he was learning a skill set that had never been collected, including Vanderbilt University.
Suddenly it hit him.
"This should be a school," she thought.
His was one of the 86 proposals to start the city’s public schools in 2002. New York was at the forefront of the movement of small schools, the closure of more than two dozen giants, failing high schools in the city and its replacement by smaller institutions.
He took his proposal to Richard Kahan, the leader of a small school network called the Urban Assembly, which guided him through bureaucratic and political waters of the city. Meanwhile, Fisher began to reach the sites and the recruitment of teachers and classmates. Your search for a director led him to Nate Dudley, a former Yale football player then teaching in the South Bronx.
In September 2003, the School of Port welcomes its first 125 freshmen. Location: reportedly, the temporary headquarters at the old Bushwick High.
Bushwick, a vibrant but low-income, immigrant neighborhood, was the type of fishing community wanted to serve. Just one problem: It happens to be away from water.
"Hey, we Harbor school," Fisher introduced himself, coming to inspect the new quarters for the first time.
A security guard looked up.
"There’s no port in Bushwick, darling," she replied.
___
Port school freshmen, having an intensive year long introductory course on the port, travel a combined total of 300 miles by bus and subway to 17 sites over the water of Jamaica Bay to the Hudson.
"We decided from the start-go that we would not let us stop distance us," Dudley said, adding that students "know more about the river than any other student in the city, and more than most adults .
Ninety-six percent of students in the School of port are black or Hispanic, three-quarters come from families poor enough to qualify for federal free lunch. Only 15 percent of freshmen can swim (85 percent passing a swim test for graduation).
Their destination, one afternoon last spring was the Upper West Side of Manhattan, where they boarded a replica of the Hudson River sloop and recipient of education, Clearwater.
In the river, the students rotate between four learning stations – the history, navigation, fisheries and water quality. Volunteer educators peppered with questions. Who was Henry Hudson? Is the tide of a stream or a stream? How do we signal other fishing boats that we?
In the old Bushwick High, only 22 percent of graduate students. Premier Port School seniors in 2007 graduated at a rate of 65 percent. That rose to 75 percent in 2008 and was 70 percent for the class of 2009.
A few have parents who attended college last year at least 90 percent of graduates passed. Most enroll in community colleges, but many attend four-year institutions, including sea programs in state universities and a handful have come to the Ivy League.
However, Fisher is satisfied. The school is doing well with 20 percent of the students he calls "true believers" – who arrive with or acquisition of genuine emotion on the water-focused mission. But it has not shown the other key element of his idea that the curriculum can improve the academic performance of the remaining 80 percent.
Governors Island will not be a panacea, but if nothing else, there will be many fewer hours lost on the subway and buses.
"The key is to have a coast line that we own and manage what we are not asking anyone’s permission," says Fisher. "So if it is 7 am and there is a bombardment of bluefish out there that a teacher can go with the students at that time."
Maritime training gets a lot more exciting when the water is not only imaginary.
"Much of the power of building a boat is to use the boat," says Fisher. "Our children have no place to use boats to build."
___
For four years, Murray pursued sites throughout the city – the South Street Seaport Museum and the Fulton Fish Market in Manhattan’s old, old docks, warehouses and factories lining the waterfront of Red Hook, Brooklyn to Queens North.
In real estate, money talks.
"There are 600 miles of coastline in New York, and everyone wants a piece," says Fisher.
"It’s not as cynical as developers do not want black 400 children in their neighborhood," he adds. But "that’s part of it."
While pursuing other sites, Fisher kept his eye on Governors Island, which had been given to the city and state. It was ideal, but a longshot. In the final round of 25 proposals was against heavyweights like the New York University and a great name for real estate developers.
The competitors were offering to pay the city and state, Kahan said. Fisher’s proposal asked for $ 34 million to build a new school.
However, it underscored his arguments for the School of the port and its mission – and in November 2006, the supervisory authority of the Governors Island school name Fisher, the winner. City and State undertook the construction money.
Four years later than promised, the school name Harbor would finally get rid of his irony.
___
Officially, the title of Fisher’s work is "founder and program director," but he is involved in nearly all aspects of the school. It shoots fundraising letters and falls in teacher recruitment, budget and procurement meetings. Between classes, he steps into the room to ride herd on the stampede of noisy students.
An important number to remember a time when the force of personality Fisher nudged them. Tanasi Swift, a recent graduate studying marine vertebrates in Stony Brook, Southampton, Fisher says helped his line jobs and internships, and persuaded her to participate in an educational program in the Bahamas third year. Darryl Gilbert, now captain of a ship of aspirants, Fisher says he stopped in the lobby until he agreed to take an internship at the South Street Seaport.
Fisher says he likes one-on-one with students, but there is another reason that hangs around: Without the eye to the sextant, Fisher worries the school could go the way of other "theme" schools that have drifted from their original mission.
But he knows that to build a lasting institution, should focus on the work done outside – Campus schmoozing donors, politicians and partners. Supplemental water programs at the school costs $ 1,000 per student, per year, on top of public funding of school. In addition, costs only 1.6 million U.S. dollars to begin the renovation of a second building on Governors Island that is essential for the site to reach their full potential.
With so many duties, Fisher laments the days are gone when regularly could tag along on field trips, and he knew every student by name. His day in Clearwater was a rare indulgence. As students disembarked, he wondered to himself, saying their names aloud. Devin. Shanice. Shali ….
For Fisher, and their students, time in the water makes all the difference. That renews your energy, and reminds him that his creation is supposed to appear.
Then it’s back to work.
"I have to create an institution where experiences are replicated more often," he says. "And that’s what’s on Governors Island."
Related posts: