Hailey Farley was among 200 students to ring the school bell Friday at Longfellow Magnet Elementary School in St. Paul, and the last who will ever do so.
When Longfellow opened in 1887, it had a bell tower to announce the beginning and end of classes to neighborhood families. When the "new" building opened in 1975, the bell was mounted there. Now Longfellow, like so many Twin Cities schools, has closed -- forever.
Hailey is one of 4,500 St. Paul students and thousands more statewide who will be affected by school closings this spring. St. Paul public schools closed eight schools this week, underscoring declining enrollment and tight budgets in the district. Other districts are feeling the pinch, too. Minneapolis public schools is closing three schools, and the Anoka-Hennepin district, the state's largest, is closing eight.
Private schools and even some charter schools are struggling as well. St. Bernard's High School in St. Paul, a 53-year-old institution, closed a week ago, and its companion grade school ended a 118-year run a year ago.
The closings leave in their wake generations of memories collected in schools such as Longfellow, Roosevelt and Ames. In recent weeks the schools have held events to say goodbye to the buildings and their traditions.
Former students, teachers and staff came to talk about changes in the local geography and the time when there was space and woods just outside the school communities, before neighborhoods became crowded.
Others talked about changes in demographics inside the schools, which opened with student bodies that were virtually all white at a time when the only men in the schools taught gym or shop class. Now they're closing with large majorities of children of color.
"Change has happened before," said Elona Street-Stewart, chair of the St. Paul school board. The buildings being closed are special, she said, "but only because of the experiences the students have had in them."
