CREC: State Cancels $108 Million Construction Project; Two Magnet Schools To Merge – Hartford Courant

A plan to build a state-funded $108 million school in Bloomfield for Two Rivers Magnet High School has been scrapped amid budget concerns, the Capitol Region Education Council said Friday.

The 400-student, environmental-themed Two Rivers High in Hartford will also cease to exist next school year and students will instead be shuttled to New Britain to attend CREC's Academy of Science and Innovation, school officials said Friday.

CREC leaders blamed Connecticut's fiscal uncertainty and state enrollment caps for the shake-up. At an afternoon press conference, Executive Director Greg Florio said the state Department of Education and state construction officials confirmed to CREC this week that the Bloomfield project would be pulled.

A stunned Two Rivers High community was informed of the plans Thursday. The school is the first full-day magnet program that CREC plans to close and consolidate.

At least $8 million had already been spent on the Bloomfield construction project, including money to buy the land, according to CREC, a taxpayer-funded regional education agency that operates 17 magnet schools under the state's Sheff v. O'Neill desegregation agreement.

Town of Bloomfield records show that CREC planned to build a 880-student high school on 29 acres at 29 Griffin Road North, near the Farmington River and Farmington River Park. CREC bought the property in 2013 for $3.8 million; now the agency is working with the state to decide what to do with the land.

Martha Stone, an attorney for the Sheff plaintiffs, said she heard late in the week that the state was axing the Two Rivers High project. "You've broken promises to kids who have already had broken promises," Stone said. "You're closing schools in the face of thousands of students clamoring to get in? ...That is just wrong."

Two Rivers high school opened in 2012 and has been temporarily housed in an office building in the Colt Armory complex near CREC's Hartford headquarters. The agency renovated that U-shaped building for $6 million to house Two Rivers High, and CREC officials said Friday they were unsure what will happen with that space.

The $108 million price tag for Two Rivers' permanent home was pricey even for Sheff magnet-school standards. State lawmakers approved the project in 2013.

Hartford Rep. Angel Arce, whose district includes the school neighborhood, chastized CREC leadership for the abrupt notice on Two Rivers' demise. Arce interrupted the press conference to question Florio, saying that he and another Hartford state lawmaker just heard the news two hours earlier.

"My biggest concern is those students don't lose their seats," Arce said.

About one-third of Two Rivers' magnet high school students are from Hartford. The rest are suburban students. CREC also operates the gleaming Two Rivers Magnet Middle School in East Hartford, which attracts about 650 students from across the region.

Families that recently applied for admission to the high school through the state-run magnet school lottery will be able to re-submit their applications with new choices, CREC Superintendent of Schools Dina Crowl said. The regular deadline for the 2017-18 lottery already passed.

Florio talked about mounting financial pressures from the state. Between 2008 and 2010, he said, the state asked CREC to open 11 magnet schools to meet integration goals under the Sheff settlement. Hartford Public Schools is another major operator of the region's magnet schools.

But as school operating costs have increased over the years, the state's annual aid to CREC has remained a flat $10,443 per student. CREC and Hartford school officials have been worried that state magnet aid will be reduced this year. Cities and towns whose students attend CREC magnets are required to pay tuition to fill the gap, a growing burden for districts that are already anxious about their budgets.

And the state has capped CREC's enrollment at 8,240 students, with minor adjustments expected to accommodate new grades at a couple of existing schools, CREC said.

An enrollment cap means that Two Rivers' high school would be stuck with only 400 or so students for the foreseeable future, far short of plans to fill the 880-student Bloomfield building, Florio said.

Donald Harris, chairman of the CREC Council and the Bloomfield board of education, said he wasn't surprised when he heard the Two Rivers high school project was canceled. "For me," he said, "it's too bad. It's really too bad."

The decision was "a tough choice during a very tough budget season," Florio said. "Although consolidating the two schools is not the road we envisioned, it is the most cost-effective way of addressing these budgetary challenges without hurting the quality of education that CREC proudly provides."

Abbe Smith, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Education, said in a statement Friday that CREC informed the state last month that they were considering merging Two Rivers High with another magnet program "to address the system's fiscal challenges."

CREC Academy of Science and Innovation, formerly known as the Medical Professions and Teacher Preparation Academy, "offers a strong, rigorous STEM-themed education in a brand-new state-of-the-art facility," Smith said.

Two Rivers Principal Robert McCain will become the principal of that consolidated school in New Britain, which will continue to focus on science, technology, engineering and math in the 2017-18 year. With the influx of Two Rivers students, CREC expects to fill the New Britain school to capacity with about 770 students, said Tim Sullivan, CREC's assistant superintendent for operations.

Students in a prekindergarten program at the Academy of Science and Innovation will be moved to other schools, Sullivan said.

Staff cuts are possible as details of the merger are figured out, Florio said.

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CREC: State Cancels $108 Million Construction Project; Two Magnet Schools To Merge - Hartford Courant