Since the Cross Country Elementary Middle School (#247) building has been demolished, many neighborhood residents have been asking “Why?” As the Secretary of the Cross Country Improvement Association, I have been involved in the meetings about the rebuilding of the Cross Country Elementary Middle School building since 2016. I have been following the letters to the editor to the Where What When about the new school. After reading the letters and speaking with neighbors who are impacted by the changes, I found that many neighbors were not aware of the process that took place that brought about the changes to the school site. Let’s look at the history of the school as well as plans for its future.
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The Cross Country Elementary School
was built in 1955 at 6100 Cross Country Boulevard. There were renovations to
the building in 1961 and in 1998. Some time between 2007 and 2009, while Dr.
Andrés Alonso was Superintendent of Baltimore City Public Schools, Cross
Country became a combined elementary-middle school. As the neighborhood
population changed since 1955, the catchment area (the area from which students
are drawn) changed. (See map.) Presently, Cross Country Elementary Middle
School’s catchment area is the city-county line to the north, Park Heights to
Fords Lane to Reisterstown Road to Patterson Avenue to the area within Wabash
Avenue and the tracks on the west, to West Northern Parkway on the south, to
Key Avenue to Glen Avenue/Cross Country Boulevard to Greenspring Avenue on the
east. In the catchment area are students from the Cross Country, Cheswolde,
Glen, Reisterstown Station, and Mount Washington neighborhoods.
In 2010 Baltimore City started
looking closely at the inadequate state of its many public school buildings. A
coalition of community members, education groups, and school system leaders got
together to work for legislation to fund the renovations and building
replacements.
Remember the bottle tax? It is Baltimore
City Ordinance No. 12-45, passed on June 26, 2012. The increased bottle tax
(from two cents to five cents) began in July 2013. This revenue has helped the
city get hundreds of millions of dollars in bonds, and paid for many school
renovations and replacements.
In 2013, when Stephanie
Rawlings-Blake was mayor, the “Baltimore City Public Schools Construction and
Revitalization Act” was passed. This law allowed the Maryland Stadium Authority
to issue bonds to finance reconstruction or improvements to specified Baltimore
City public schools over a 10-year plan. They secured a $1.1 billion-dollar
investment. A partnership was established between Baltimore City Schools, the
State of Maryland, The Maryland Stadium Authority, and Baltimore City to
implement the financing program and established the 21st Century
School Buildings Program, along with the Interagency Commission on Public
School Construction.
This entity oversees the
construction, revitalization, relocation, and closure of Baltimore City public school
buildings that were identified for the program. The program has a website (www.baltimore21stcenturyschools.org).
While perusing the website, read the Memorandum of Understanding. It explains
the 21st Century School Buildings Program’s goals and purposes. You
can find the Cross Country Elementary/Middle School page here: www.baltimore21stcenturyschools.org/schools/395.
Note the new space for shared community use, such as the playgrounds, ball
courts, and a community room for meetings and voting.
* * *
I urge community members to attend
the virtual meetings to learn about the progress and plans for the site.
Community input is important and leads to changes in the plans. An example is
the playgrounds for the younger children. In a former plan, the pre-K and kindergarten
playground was separated from the grades one-through-three playground by a
building. Due to community input, the two playgrounds are in the same area so
that parents and guardians can watch their younger and older children at the
same time.
One can sign up for the next virtual
meeting about the Cross Country construction here: www.baltimore21stcenturyschools.org/cross-countryconstruction-update-meeting-0.
For questions relating to anything about the new school please contact Renee
Stainrod, Manager, Community and Public Relations, 21st Century
School Buildings Program (rastainrod@bcps.k12.md.us).
There are other benefits to the
community with a revitalized Cross Country school. One of them is recreational
opportunities. The Maryland Stadium Authority’s website states that one of its
goals is to, “Design schools that allow for recreational opportunities for the
community, combined with other cooperative uses and school partnership
programs” (www.mdstad.com/21st-century-schools).
Cross Country Elementary Middle
School also provides psychological services, social work services, speech and
language therapy, occupational therapy, physical therapy, and other special
education modalities to students. Students who attend private and Jewish day schools
are able to access speech/language as well as occupational and physical
therapies from Cross Country Elementary School. These services are then
provided at the child’s private school. (To apply for these services fill-out
the PEN form at this link https://cjebaltimore.org/programs/mdsnap/ or ask for
the form from the school your child attends.) Moreover, there are Jewish
children in the neighborhood who attend Cross Country Elementary Middle School.
Importantly for the greater community, the middle school is known for its STEM
and robotics programs as well as a winning chess team.
* * *
Another aspect of the memorandum is
plans for the highest standards for educational facilities and green building
practices. The new building will be energy efficient. Teachers and students
will have dedicated areas to meet the educational needs of the students in
keeping with the federal Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015, its school-wide
Title I status, and the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future Act of 2021.
Cross Country was chosen to be
included in the group of schools examined in the second year of the 21st
Century School Buildings Program. Originally, the plan was to renovate the
existing school building. Meetings to discuss plans for the school began in
2014. The plan in 2017 was to just renovate the building and not add any
classrooms and to maintain capacity for 680 students. This was in keeping with
a 1996 zoning amendment that limits the size of the school building to
accommodate no more than 750 students.
Then, in 2018, the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA) published a new digital flood insurance rate map. New
FEMA requirements went into effect June 2021 that required Baltimore City to
update its floodplain policy. It turns out that the old Cross Country school
building was situated in the 500-year floodplain on the Pinkney Road side. The
plan to renovate was changed in favor of building a new school outside the
floodplain on the Taney Road end of the site. (See pictures.) Presently, Turner
Construction is working onsite through the summer to continue the grading,
utility, foundation, and structure placement. If you or your children like to
watch the assembling of buildings in real time, consult the construction
schedule.
* * *
One issue that has not been resolved
pertaining to the new school plan is traffic and parking. In the past there
have been traffic jams; unsafe driving practices, such as U-turns on Cross
Country Boulevard; cars parked blocking private home driveways; and inadequate
parking for school employees. The Cross Country Improvement Association plans
ongoing discussions about this with elected officials, the Baltimore City
Department of Transportation, the 21st Century School Buildings
Program, and representatives from the school.
To become
involved in the community, contact your neighborhood association. For Cross
Country or Cheswolde, please send an email to cccbalt1@gmail.com; fFor Glen, to
myglen.org or cherniakb@gmail.com; for Fallstaff, www.myfallstaff.org; and for
Mt. Washington, www.mwia.org.
