Lincoln Elementary School Moves to Pulaski High

Casimir Pulaski High School at 2500 W. Oklahoma Ave. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

All the major elected officials were there as Lincoln Avenue elementary students entered Pulaski High School for the first time on Tuesday: Milwaukee Public Schools Superintendent Brenda Cassellius, School Board President Missy Zombor, State Superintendent Jill Underly, Gov. Tony Evers, Mayor Cavalier Johnson and others.

In June, Lincoln Avenue School was destroyed after rags soaked with cleaning solvent ignited in a building with no sprinkler system. But Carmen charter school had meanwhile moved out of the Pulaski building, which it shared with the regular MPS high school International Baccalaureate program. That space provided a home for the Lincoln Avenue students.

The MPS administration scrambled to modify space for the elementary program, bringing in elementary desks, whiteboards and a host of other materials. Elementary students would enter the building from the north side, while high school students would enter from the south. Different lunch hours and starting and ending times would keep the two schools separate and independent in one building.

No one was sure how the Lincoln Avenue community would embrace the change. But Cassellius told Urban Milwaukee that the school lost very few students. In fact, new families enrolled, she noted, without providing any numbers.

The first day of school for Lincoln Avenue elementary students presented some hopes, but also some unexpected challenges.

Elementary students don’t normally have individual lockers. Often hooks and open shelves outside the classrooms are provided for students to hang their coats and store their backpacks. But because the space here was a high school, some modifications had to be made.

The combination locks were removed from the lockers. Any teacher who has had to teach a new middle or high school student how to open a locker understands why the combinations were gone.

But when third graders opened their lockers, they faced a new problem: They had difficulty hanging their backpacks on the hooks that seemed just beyond their reach.

No matter how hard the school administration tried to accommodate the elementary school community at this high school, the difficulty these students faced at their lockers is symbolic of the challenges they will face this year. Some students were only able to reach the hooks just outside of their reach with the help of a teacher. That help will be required for other tasks throughout the year as well.

The sign above a doorway down the hall doesn’t say Lincoln Avenue; it says Pulaski. But the administration has made great strides to make each elementary classroom as welcoming as possible. It is a work in progress.

Just how long Lincoln students will be at Pulaski is unknown. One Pulaski teacher told this Urban Milwaukee reporter that she heard it would take three years to build a new elementary school. When asked about the possibility of Pulaski becoming a K-12 school, she responded negatively to the idea. This was just one teacher, and no survey has been taken. But change is hard.

When Cassellius was asked the same question, she did not answer directly but pointed out that, unlike the near North Side, which has underutilized buildings, the near South Side is short of classroom space. New capacity is needed.

However, she added that much of the decision-making will be up to the community. Cassellius made it clear that in closing a school or moving students, the parents must feel like they are gaining something rather than losing. In the case of Lincoln Avenue, there was no building to hang on to. This move had to happen.

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