Gary Moskowitz
The Glendale Preparatory Academy has moved into the old Edison
Elementary School for the upcoming school year, but plans to convert
the site into a satellite campus for Glendale High School in 2004 are
still underway.
The academy is a state-funded program that helps students who are
below grade-level standards in English and math increase their
skills. Children who attend the program typically are year-round
elementary school students in grades four through six and on break
from their regular classes.
Test results on state-assessment exams or district and school
writing and math test results determine which students can benefit
from entering the program, officials said.
The academy, since February 2000, has been housed in about 10
portable classrooms on a downtown city lot at the corner of Orange
and Colorado streets. The school is funded entirely by state grants,
but district officials would not detail the school's operating
budget.
The school, beginning next month, will be housed in a row of
portable classrooms at the old Edison campus, said Connie Lue, the
director of early education and extended learning programs for the
Glendale Unified School District. Officials have not decided if the
academy will remain at the site after the high school satellite
classes start there.
"I think [the old Edison Elementary site] will be an environment
where kids really feel like they are in school," Lue said. "They will
have a little more space to move around, and can use the school's
eating area, which will be nice. We are just happy to have a place to
offer this to kids. It does make a positive difference in student
performance."
The old Edison campus was designated by the school board last
month as a satellite campus to ease overcrowding at Glendale High
School, but a site-planning principal -- who has not been selected --
will be given a year to conduct research and determine how the
satellite campus will be used, district officials said.
The school district leased the downtown property from the city for
free. It will move the academy off the property and have utilities
disconnected by the end of the month, officials said.
The downtown site will eventually become part of the city's Town
Center development, which will be a 15.5-acre, mixed-use, retail and
multifamily project, said Mark Berry, a project manager for the
city's Redevelopment Agency.
"It was nice to have some activity on the site," Berry said. "It
was a benefit to local schools and a benefit to the city to have
activity there, as opposed to people just seeing an empty space
there. It was a good interim use."
The city is completing routine testing of the site for any soil
contamination, Berry said.
